How much military aid is the US giving Israel?
Polygraph | Newsletter n°259 | 25 July 2024
*Check out my new article in Forever Wars: Cops Arrested Over 3,500 Pro-Gaza Campus Protesters, New Data Shows. Thanks to really good editing, I don’t think you’ll find a better analysis of the crackdown on demonstrations at US colleges. And be sure to follow Forever Wars (if you aren’t already) — Spencer and Sam produce great content all the time.
*Please welcome/thank our latest paid subscribers, Hans S. and James H. You’ll now see their names at the bottom of each note, along with the other heroes who keep this newsletter going. You can join them here:
Situation
Total US military aid to Israel stands at $18 billion so far in 2024. The annual funding bill passed in March included almost $4 billion for this purpose: From the State Department’s budget, $3.3 billion; from the Pentagon’s, $500 million for missile programs, $47.5 million for a joint anti-tunneling program (seriously), and $40 million for a counter-drone and laser technology program.
A supplemental funding bill passed in April provided an additional $14.1 billion in military aid.1 There’s another couple billion dollars that I didn’t include in the chart below because it’s technically not military aid. But it’s awfully close — it’s funding for the US to fight wars on Israel’s behalf. The bill provides $2.4 billion “only for US operations, force protection, deterrence, and the replacement of combat expenditures in the United States Central Command region.”2 Over the last few months, the Pentagon has spent $1 billion fighting the Houthis in the Red Sea. The Houthis say their attacks will continue until Israel stops bombing Gaza.
Additionally, Israel has likely received millions of dollars worth of military hardware through the Excess Defense Articles program this year too, but the Pentagon’s EDA data doesn’t go beyond 2020. Note: This $18 billion figure is based strictly on the federal appropriations that have been made public, and the appropriations that are explicitly for foreign aid to Israel. Put simply, it’s an underestimate. Moreover, this figure does not include a full accounting of the US’ financial investment into Israel’s war, like military operational costs, diplomatic costs, loss of tax revenue, etc.
Context
As a per year sum, the $18 billion in Israeli military aid approved for 2024 is the most ever, even after adjusting for inflation. As a per year average, no other US president has given Israel more weapons than Joe Biden. Tell him this and he’d probably take it as a compliment.
Not some, but all of this military aid for Israel was approved after Israel was charged with genocide at the ICJ, and after the ICJ ruled genocide plausible and advanced the case to the next stage of deliberation. Here are the circumstances surrounding the next highest annual totals. All dollars are constant 2024 dollars.3
FY1979, $14 billion: Egypt-Israel peace treaty. It wasn’t the treaty itself, but the Special International Security Assistance Act of 1979 (Public Law 96-35) enacted a few months later that provided funding for “a one time extraordinary assistance package” to Israel (and Egypt).
FY1974, $13 billion: Bailed out Israel during the October 1973 War.
FY1976, $8 billion: Fiscal year 1976 was 15 months long. The federal fiscal year used to go from July 1 to June 30, but it changed to October 1 to September 30 right before FY1977. So that left a 3-month period between July 1, 1976 and September 30, 1976 in limbo. It’s called the “transition quarter.” The TQ often gets its own row or column in federal datasets (including those used in this analysis, like USAID’s Overseas Loans and Grants “Greenbook”), but for the chart below I lumped it in — and the funds provided to Israel during that stretch — in with FY1976.
^Alt text for screen readers: As Israel is tried for genocide, Biden sends it a record amount of military aid. This line graph shows US military aid to Israel from 1970 to 2024 in constant 2024 dollars. There are peaks in 1974, 1976, and 1979 and then the line hovers around $4 billion for the next 40-something years before shooting up to the $18 billion mark in 2024. Data: USAID, Congressional Research Service, Public Laws 118-47 and 118-50.
SPECIAL THANKS TO: Alan F., Andrew R., Bart B., BeepBoop, Bill S., Byron D., Chris G., David S.,* David V.,* Francis M., Gary W., George C., Hans S., Irene B., James H., Jcowens004, Jerry S., John A., Joseph B., Kheng L., Linda B., Lora L., Marie R., Matthew H.,* Megan., Meghan W., Nick B., Omar D.,* Peter M., Philip L., Rosemary K., Silversurfer7, Springseep, Theresa A., Themadking724, Tim C., Tony L., Tony T.
* = founding member
-Stephen (Follow me on Instagram, Twitter, and Bluesky)
Of that amount, $8.7B is direct military aid. Another $5.4B in “operation and maintenance” and “procurement” funding under Title I “to respond to the situation in Israel.” Based on the way the bill is written, the intent of this funding is primarily to replace matériel transferred to Israel directly from US stocks, possibly under section 506(a)(1) of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961. The bill raised the cap for this “drawdown authority” from $100M to $7.8B. In other words, the $5.4 billion is to pay for in-kind military grants — the funds cover the cost of additional arms transfers to Israel. The value of these transfers in FY2024 could end up being much higher than they amount appropriated in the bill for FY2024. There is reporting and testimony indicating that Israel has drawn from a US stockpile located in Israel (the US War Reserve Stockpile Allies - Israel, or WRSA-I). In a statement about the supplemental funding bill for Israel, Rep. Dina Titus wrote that the bill includes “$4.4 billion to replenish U.S. stocks of equipment sent to Israel through Presidential drawdown authority.” This is in-line with the stated intent of Biden’s original request: “ reimburse DOD components for defense services and military education and training provided to the government of Israel under section 506(a)(1) of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 (22 U.S.C. 2318(a).” The request and bill also waived restrictions on the amount and type of equipment the US can directly transfer to Israel, as well as the value of the concessions Israel provides in exchange: the bill struck “at least equal to the fair market value of the items transferred” and inserted “in an amount to be determined by the Secretary of Defense.” It also waived the amount of weapons the US can stockpile in Israel (in the WRSA-I), from which Israel can draw from upon approval by the US Secretary of Defense, effectively creating a “free-flowing pipeline to provide any defense articles to Israel by the simple act of placing them in the WRSA-I, or other stockpiles intended for Israel.”
There’s another $75 million for a regional “security assistance” program and another $10M for “peacekeeping operations” in the Sinai.
The amounts in this analysis refer to unclassified grant obligations and loan authorizations except for fiscal year 2024, which refer to military aid appropriations. These appropriations represent the estimated value of cash and in-kind grants ultimately obligated for military aid to Israel.